Carbon/carbon (“C/C”) parts are employed in various industries. An exemplary use for C/C parts includes using C/C parts as friction disks such as aircraft brake disks, race car brake disks, clutch disks, and the like. Conventionally, C/C aircraft brakes are manufactured from preforms that have been cut or die punched from a long board of uniformly needled oxidized polyacrylonitrile (PAN) fibers (“OPF”) material. Each horizontal layer of the preform is typically laid down and needled continuously across the majority of each surface of the preform. Needling is typically followed by carbonization and densification. Needling of OPF or carbon fiber material may affect certain performance characteristics of C/C parts, including densification, mechanical strength, heat conduction, and friction and wear characteristics.